CYNTHIA STAMATION
CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER
Teamwork is essential to practice success, but teams can be complicated. Sometimes doctors must make decisions that have the potential to disappoint teams (or specific team members), create resistance, or cause stress. It can be a dilemma to determine whether to prioritize team harmony over other factors that are part of your decision.
When faced with choices that may be unpopular or result in open disagreement among the team, here are some tips to help doctors navigate and evaluate the right course of action:
Seek input but reserve judgment
The #1 rule of leadership is to engage and empower the team to effectively achieve the practice’s goals. The input of the team should always be asked for when appropriate. Give team members the opportunity to express their point of view and to know that their opinion is important and valued. This can be done in a team meeting, but also give team members an opening to communicate privately with you.
However, teamwork does not mean democracy, especially on factors that are solely within the discretion of the business owner. For those factors, it’s important to assert that the final decision belongs to the leader, but the team’s input will be carefully considered.
Avoid the people pleaser trap
People pleasers care a lot about whether other people like them, and always want others to approve of their actions. As a result, people pleasers tend to over-prioritize the wants and needs of others at the expense of their own. They are prone to over-compensating to avoid conflict, becoming reactive to emotional responses, and taking on too much responsibility that should fall on others.
As a team leader, it’s important to establish boundaries and prioritize goals. Whenever you catch yourself feeling guilty for the practice’s needs or worrying about team disagreement dominating your decision-making, it’s time to step back and ask yourself what would a neutral third party do in the same situation.
Get expert advice and guidance
Often a difficult decision is made more difficult when we do not have 100% confidence in the best course of action. If we’re uncertain that Option A is right, then the status quo Option B that at least keeps the team happy seems like a comparable choice. That doesn’t necessarily solve the problem, but just kicks it farther down the street.
It is a lot to assume that as team leader you need to know everything about everything. That’s an impossible task. The solution is to have resources you can call upon when you need guidance or insight. Sometimes that is a colleague who you can bounce ideas off outside the practice. Sometimes it’s a mentor who helps you stay on track. It can also be a practice coach who is very experienced in team dynamics and different strategies that can help you achieve your goals.
Be compassionate but detached on outside factors
One of the most difficult things for a team leader is how to respond to personal issues that a team member may have. This particularly involves outside factors in the team member’s life that are affecting them at work, or they ask for some kind of workplace accommodation to help with their personal situation. It’s important for team leaders to be compassionate and caring toward the team. But they must also be detached, which means they can’t be responsible for “fixing” someone’s personal problems.
When a team member is having a genuine personal issue then it’s okay to extend a temporary workplace accommodation—if you would do the same for every team member in the same circumstances. However, if you find yourself tempted to agree with a more permanent accommodation, or one that would not equally apply to other team members, it’s time to set boundaries.
Recognize when saying yes means saying no to something else
As a final tip, remember that your time as the team leader, practice owner and doctor is mission critical. Few doctors feel their time is so open and available that they could take on more things. Usually, doctors have time pressures at the office, when they take work home from the office, and at home too.
In a busy life, when you say yes to something that adds to your time requirements and responsibilities, then you are saying no to something else … like time with your family, or time to rest and relax. You can’t be a great doctor and team leader when you are overloaded and overwhelmed. That means prioritizing your life and how the practice can support you to have the best life possible.